1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a method of driving a display panel, and, more particularly, to a method of driving a display panel used in a liquid crystal display (“LCD”), and a display apparatus having the LCD.
2. Description of the Related Art
Generally, a liquid crystal display (“LCD”) apparatus includes a lower substrate, an upper substrate and a liquid crystal layer interposed between the upper substrate and the lower substrate. In an LCD apparatus, an alignment of liquid crystal molecules in the liquid crystal layer is varied in response to a voltage difference between a common electrode of the upper substrate and a pixel electrode of the lower substrate. More specifically, an electric field is generated between the common electrode and the pixel electrode, based on the voltage difference. The alignment of the liquid crystal molecules varies according to the electric field, and a light transmittance through the liquid crystal layer is thereby controlled to display an image.
The liquid crystal molecules of the LCD apparatus are anisotropic. As a result, an image display quality of the LCD apparatus varies based on a viewing angle. Thus, a conventional LCD apparatus has a narrower viewing angle than other types of display apparatuses. To improve the viewing angle of the LCD apparatus, a super patterned vertical alignment (“SPVA”) mode LCD apparatus and an electrically-induced optical compensation (“EOC”) mode LCD apparatus have been developed.
In the SPVA mode LCD apparatus, a common electrode is formed on an upper substrate, and a pixel electrode is formed on a lower substrate. The common electrode and the pixel electrode are patterned to form multiple domains thereon. During operation, different voltages are applied to the patterned common electrode and the patterned pixel electrode. More specifically, different voltages are applied to the multiple domains of the common electrode and the pixel electrode to improve a viewing angle of an image displayed on the SPVA mode LCD apparatus.
The EOC mode LCD apparatus includes a first substrate and a second substrate. The first substrate includes two electrodes disposed substantially parallel to each other. The first substrate and the second substrate include vertical alignment layers formed thereon. A liquid crystal layer having positive dielectric anisotropy is interposed between the first substrate and the second substrate. When a voltage is applied to the two electrodes of the first substrate, an electric field is generated in a substantially horizontal direction between the first substrate and the second substrate. Liquid crystal molecules in the liquid crystal layer are aligned by the electric field to display an image on the EOC mode LCD apparatus.
To display the image, however, the EOC mode LCD apparatus requires a large cell gap (e.g., a thickness of the liquid crystal layer between the first substrate and the second substrate) relative to other LCD apparatuses. As a result, the EOC mode LCD apparatus has disadvantages such as lower light transmittance, lower response time and narrower viewing angle, for example, in comparison with other display apparatuses such as the SPVA mode LCD apparatus. Therefore, it is desired to develop an EOC mode LCD apparatus which overcomes the abovementioned disadvantages.